LineNoise

joined 2 years ago
 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese sang praise for the first project under his government's $2 billion social housing accelerator fund. Not everyone is convinced social housing is the answer to Australia's housing crisis.

 

Former WA premier Mark McGowan has taken on a senior role at the former federal treasurer Joe Hockey's consultancy firm, among four new jobs, including appointments to mining companies Mineral Resources and BHP.

 

The UN working group visited Australia for the first time in December last year. Their task was to evaluate the human rights situation of people of African descent living in Australia.

 

The media is being used to amplify the hateful rhetoric of fringe right-wing groups, a leading expert warns.

 

Sixty Victorian not-for-profit organisations have written to Premier Jacinta Allan and Treasurer Tim Pallas to urge them to abolish state-owned logging business VicForests.

 

Sixty Victorian not-for-profit organisations have written to Premier Jacinta Allan and Treasurer Tim Pallas to urge them to abolish state-owned logging business VicForests.

 

Attorney general Jaclyn Symes says she did not want debate ‘about a youth crime crisis that doesn’t exist’ from the bail amendment bill

 

Commonwealth agrees to settle with more than 120 Indonesians wrongly detained as adult people smugglers, some when they were as young as 12

 

The Pacific's top diplomat says Australia's credibility in the region will be bolstered if the nation votes in favour of the Indigenous Voice to Parliament on October 14.

 

More than five years after a royal commission recommended Darwin's notorious Don Dale Youth Detention Centre be closed, the facility is still in use.

 

Coroners around Australia are frustrated their potentially life-saving recommendations to prevent Indigenous suicide are being routinely ignored by the government, a new national report has found.

 

The corruption watchdog has conceded it has "no power" to publicise a report into former deputy-premier, Jackie Trad, following a decision by the High Court last month.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 9 points 2 years ago (4 children)

It’s very clear at this point that Albanese has put stakes on the table that his government was utterly unprepared to fight for.

Albanese was in parliament for the peak of the History Wars period, the 1999 referendum, and the dissolution of ATSIC. He can not reasonably claim he was unaware of what the opposition to this would look like and how it would behave, and yet none of it was preempted.

Unless there is something truly remarkable waiting in the wings I fear signing these writs effectively sees serious steps toward reconciliation pushed back another generation.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 24 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Stop using Google services and products in general ideally. They've become a fundamental threat to a functional web.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 8 points 2 years ago

Some actual public housing expenditure is welcome, but for it to be 10% of the handout of developers is problematic in the extreme.

With how damaging the Victorian model has proven here and the near complete inaction on public housing it has whitewashed I'm inclined to think this was a policy better sunk entirely. It spends money and commits capacity to developers that we need to build true public housing.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 7 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Whilst this department has been a mess for years it's difficult to see that staffing cuts on this scale will be any improvement without major cultural and procedural changes being made first.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 5 points 2 years ago

Interactions with the justice system in Australia are criminogenic, ie. they increase the likelihood of reoffending. Especially when it comes to youth offenders.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-15/buried-report-on-youth-detention-raising-the-age/101635706

Australia’s primary approaches are failing to produce correctional outcomes and doubling down on that will make the problem worse, not better, regardless of how much populist politics might wish it to be otherwise. We do have models that have demonstrated success but they’re all in a therapeutic justice tradition.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Try 12ft.io if you’re having issues reading. This really underscores the utter failure of Victoria’s affordable housing model - well, unless you’re an housing developer - and it should be ringing alarm bells that the current intention is to repeat the model nationally.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 10 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Try 12ft.io if you’re having issues reading. This really underscores the utter failure of Victoria’s affordable housing model - well, unless you’re an housing developer - and it should be ringing alarm bells that the current intention is to repeat the model nationally.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 4 points 2 years ago

Dr Brown pointed out that the $20 million figure was the same amount heard at a coronial inquest last month.

The coronial inquest heard a working group for domestic violence funding in the NT identified $180 million over five years was the "absolute minimum" the government needed to provide the DSFV sector.

It further heard the working group was told to revise that figure down to $90 million, before the government then committed $20 million over two years.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 38 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Troy Gray, the secretary of the Electrical Trades Union (ETU), told Guardian Australia that a campaign would be launched by an alliance of unions and outdoor recreation and hunting groups next week, urging a database of about 300,000 emails to contact their local Labor MP.

Members of the Building Industry Group of Unions, which includes the ETU as well as the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, the CFMEU and the plumbers’ union, have also committed to spending a further $2m on the campaign to “defend our rights to the great outdoors”.

If you’re a member of one of these unions it might be a good time to get in touch and ask them wtf they think they’re doing with your dues.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 11 points 2 years ago

Troy Gray, the secretary of the Electrical Trades Union (ETU), told Guardian Australia that a campaign would be launched by an alliance of unions and outdoor recreation and hunting groups next week, urging a database of about 300,000 emails to contact their local Labor MP.

Members of the Building Industry Group of Unions, which includes the ETU as well as the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, the CFMEU and the plumbers’ union, have also committed to spending a further $2m on the campaign to “defend our rights to the great outdoors”.

If you’re a member of one of these unions it might be a good time to get in touch and ask them wtf they think they’re doing with your dues.

[–] LineNoise@kbin.social 2 points 2 years ago

Greens are between a rock and a hard place because there remains significant internal dissent from First Nations quarters, or at least unease. Don't forget that in February we were here: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/feb/08/greens-first-nations-conveners-side-with-lidia-thorpe-and-say-they-do-not-support-voice-to-parliament

That's moderated some since but the First Nations activist support I've seen within the Greens here in Victoria at least has been framed around "a no vote will be the worse outcome" rather than much enthusiastic support. Issues around the validity of representation and recognition still loom large here and despite the recent First Peoples' Assembly elections are yet to be thrashed out at a state level.

As for Labor? Well the Queensland, NT and WA governments have made it pretty clear how much they intend to listen to First Nation voices. Not at all. Even the Federal Government have had some notable examples of picking only the advice they wanted to hear.

This feels like it would have been better off pushed until the next election or after. There's internal fronts that needed to be agreed upon first.

I'll be voting yes, but I'm also expecting a very disappointing government response to the Voice should it get up. I'm just hoping that disappointment is very, very publicly aired.

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